The communications industry is rapidly changing to adjust to emerging technologies and ever increasing customer demand. This customer demand for new applications and increased performance of existing applications is driving communications network and system providers to employ networks and systems having greater speed and capacity (e.g., greater bandwidth). In trying to achieve these goals, a common approach taken by many communications providers is to use packet switching technology.
Reliably communicating information in a network is important. Service providers enter into Service Level Agreements (SLA) which set forth certain performance characteristics which must be met. Also, network operators desire to understand the performance of their network. Customers and network providers use various tools to measure certain operational characteristics of their networks.